Exam season is upon us yet again. It’s that time of year when you realise you should have taken the finger out about two months ago and actually done some work. Be grand they said. So now that you are spending your days wasting away in the library; you have to encourage yourself that you are doing well and you must reward yourself. This comes to us in the form of procrastination; such a fabulous word. Here are the 10 signs that you are, in fact, a procrastinator (sure someone has to be don’t they).

It’s Tuesday morning. Yesterday you managed a solid hour (over the course of eight hours) study and it has really taken it out of you. You decide that you can sleep in today because you’re rewarding yourself for all of yesterday’s work. Well done.

We’ve all been there. You’ve just made a to-do list for the day of ‘study’ ahead and by god are you shattered from making that list. You deserve a nap, YES YOU DO. You’re doing so well!

You’ve just finished writing five hundred words of the most boring rubbish you have ever written in your life. You definitely need a cup of tea and a bar of chocolate after that; sure how else will you get your energy back up!

Coffee is a dear friend. Cue endless cups of the good stuff to finish off assignments and to get the brain going at six a.m. on the morning of an exam.

The tea/ coffee break is also an important time to catch up with people you haven’t really been talking with properly for several weeks. You get the Facebook message ‘Coffee?’ and that’s all you need to up sticks and leave the library for at least a good half an hour. A proper catch up is vital at this point in your life, obviously.

Whether you’re starting from scratch with Game of Thrones or re-watching One Tree Hill assignment week and study week are great times to begin watching a TV series. Law and Order, Boston Legal and even the West Wing are ideal viewing; especially if you’re studying law. Sayings such as; ‘Just one more episode, then I’ll go to bed’ and ‘Ah sure I might as well start watching this, isn’t everyone else in the same boat’, are commonly heard. It has to be done; anything to avoid study.

You’ve just arrived into the library. You open the laptop to start the day and BOOM. Facebook just appears out of nowhere, suddenly you’re scrolling through the newsfeed like there is no tomorrow. You’re liking anything that interests you and clicking ‘attending’ on the end of year drinking session. Then you see the amount of people online and immediately see does anyone want to go for coffee… all that scrolling really took it out of you; you need a boost.

Oh look, it’s ten a.m. and you have three new snapchats! Guess what; they’re all of your friends who are probably sitting beside you and telling you how bored, tired and hungry they are already. You laugh and screen shot the image. You see your friend receive the notification of this and laugh like an idiot at his/ her scowl. Then you go for coffee with said friends.

What’s that I see? There’s spilt coffee in the cupboard? I MUST CLEAN IT AND THE WHOLE ENTIRE HOUSE. Exam time is a time of high stress; therefore living in a clean(ish) environment is key to passing isn’t it? After all, if you fail to prepare you prepare to fail; isn’t that what the lecturers told you! The house gets hoovered, swept, mopped, scrubbed and all the other tasks that go with cleaning. While you’re at it sure you might as well clean out your room and laugh at the things you find. Cleaning is an important aspect of procrastinating.

Procrastination on YouTube can go on for hours, so much so you might even miss out on that nap or cup of tea. It’s just endless. From stupid videos, to the serious kind, there’s always one person you can see with headphones in and guffawing like a baboon at their screen. We all remember Fenton…FENTON!!!!! You can watch that memorable video of Fentonhere.

Exam and assignment stress has turned you to cigarettes. The cigarette break is now happening as often as the coffee break. Even if you are not a smoker you find yourself having the ‘odd one’ and joining your friends for the nicotine fueled break. It is also worth pointing out that if you roll your own cigarettes another five minutes of time is spent crafting the perfect rollie.

You have such much work to do, you have to go home and do the shopping, and you’ve to go training tonight to top it all off. Complaining is another aspect of the modern day procrastinator. You complain about the time, the weather, the cost of a cup of tea, the hole in your sock, how screwed you are for exams and how you should have started studying ages ago. Again, the list is endless. You never shut up complaining; your housemates are sick of it and your parents are sick of it. Even the traffic light cone you woke up next to after that night of RAG week is sick listening to you.

You are the next Nigella Lawson/ Jamie Oliver. In order for one to pass one’s exams, one must eat healthily, isn’t that right? You are now a culinary genius. You can make the best dinners and that roast you made Wednesday evening did go down a treat with the housemates. Even though said roast took around three hours in the oven, impeccable chopping of vegetables, mashing of spuds and creating the perfect gravy; it was SO worth it. It took up half the evening and afterwards you were too stomached to move; ah well there’s always tomorrow to really get cracking on the study.

You’ve got the J1 or the summer holiday booked. It is now late April. That toned physique or bikini body isn’t going to materialise out of thin air now is it? So you’ve started working out in the gym. You paid membership in January, went once and now it’s almost May and you just have to get your money’s worth. You now go at least three times a week. Instead of studying you hit the gym; makes sense doesn’t it?

So there you have it. The ten signs that you are a procrastinator! Have you got any procrastinating tips? Leave a comment below!